


Observations

by Fragged



Category: Stargate Universe
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-19
Updated: 2015-06-15
Packaged: 2018-03-29 21:12:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 14,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3910861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fragged/pseuds/Fragged
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once, twice a week, they meet up in the observation deck. Privately, in the dead of night, they'll share a drink.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He doesn't expect to see anyone in the observation deck at 3 AM, so he's slightly surprised to find Colonel Young there, sitting on one of the benches and looking out at the slowly spiraling trails of color. He's bowed forward, hands clasped together and arms leaning on his knees. 

Rush is still deciding whether to go in or to keep walking when Young speaks. 

“Can't sleep?” 

Well... 

He'd slept, but a nightmare had woken him and he hadn't wanted to close his eyes again. Ever since their run-in with the Nakai last week, his nightmares have been back. They'd been getting better; he'd begun thinking he was past it, and then they'd attacked Destiny again, disrupting the shields and drilling holes in the hull and, apparently, dismantling his psychological armor in the process as well. The mental scab feels like it's been peeled off too soon, and even during the daytime he finds himself remembering flashes of blue translucent skin, and cold water, and pain. 

“Something like that,” Rush answers, taking a seat next to Young before he can tell himself why he probably shouldn't. 

It's irrational, but for some reason he feels slightly better when Young is near. Slightly less on edge. 

He's _aware_ it's irrational, because if it wasn't for Young he wouldn't have been captured by the Nakai in the first place. 

But sometimes... Sometimes he dreams about the blue alien breaking his glass cage. Breaking him free. Of giving it that transmitting device and seeing _inside_ , and realizing that it is Young, that Young is here to save him, and the overwhelming rush of gratitude that makes it hard to keep hating the man. Sometimes he dreams about that. 

Young looks at him, angling his chin to the side to take in Rush's face. 

Rush knows he looks haggard. Long days and short nights and the constant jitter of fear – because they got away this time, but what about the next? – it all translates into dark shadows under his eyes and exaggerated creases in his skin. 

He ignores Young's stare, and keeps his gaze on the window. Their reflections look like different people. Almost like two friends having an amicable moment in the privacy of night. He tracks Young's movements as he grabs for something, his canteen, and offers it to Rush. 

Rush takes it without looking, and unscrews the lid to take a drink. It's Brody's, of course. Ethanol and not much more, no real flavor or scent; but it's at least 120 proof, and its one redeeming quality is something he won't refuse right now. 

“Drinking alone?” he asks, needling, as he passes back the canteen. 

Young gives him an unhappy little smile, one of the many in his repertoire, and takes a sip. “Not anymore.” 

They sit together in silence, passing the canteen back and forth, as the alcohol slowly numbs the parts of his brain that move too fast to ever reassure, that care too much about keeping up appearances.

“They're never going to stop,” Rush says into the quiet. 

Young takes the canteen from him, fingers grazing against his – an accident, probably – and Rush ignores it in favor of staring at their reflections again. Young is looking at him, and Rush knows he understands he means the Nakai. Of course he means the Nakai. 

“We'll be okay,” Young says, and he sounds entirely convinced, which Rush thinks is bizarrely impressive when one is saying something that is based solely on belief, rather than fact. 

“You don't know that.” 

Young smiles at him, and Rush sees it in the observation window. It's a small quirk of lips, almost shy, and slightly less unhappy than his earlier one. Rush wonders if it's inappropriate that he's started to keep a mental log of the different kinds of smiles Young sends him. 

It doesn't really matter, no one will ever find out. 

“Yeah, I do,” Young says. “Destiny will keep us safe.” Young looks around the observation deck with an amount of fondness that makes Rush's heart flutter in his chest. Because he feels the same way, and he had never expected Young to be the one to truly understand better than anyone else on the ship. 

“And we'll keep her safe,” Young says, turning to him again. He nudges the metal canteen against Rush's fingers, and Rush has the sudden urge to close his hand around Young's. To feel the warm, dry skin of Young's fingers against his own. 

Instead, he takes the canteen and empties it. He feels good. A little woozy, but much calmer than when he'd come here. Most of it is due to the alcohol, of course, but he doesn't feel the need to deny that some of it is Young, too. His sturdy, unmoving presence. His baseless, but oddly convincing platitudes. His physical shape, even – the warmth radiating off him, and the cut of his military jacket. 

Rush screws the lid onto the canteen, and hands it back to Young. 

“I'm going to bed,” he says, without making a move to actually stand up from the bench. “So should you, Colonel.” 

Young turns halfway to him, a weary expression on his face. 

“Yeah, probably.” He studies the empty canteen in his hands for a few seconds. “In a little bit, maybe.”

Rush still hasn't gotten up. “Why're you here?” he finally asks.

Young is quiet for a long while. Eventually, he looks up at Rush, something of a challenge on his face. “Nightmares.”

And it comes as something of a surprise to Rush, the idea that Young has nightmares too, even if it shouldn't. Because in the years they've been here the Colonel has been through some rough times, and there must have been more before he even came to Icarus. 

Rush had only learned the details of the Lucian Alliance attack on the planet Young was stationed at when they'd been working together for nearly six months. By then their relationship had already been so strained that he'd barely felt any sympathy for Young losing almost everyone under his command. But if he looks at it now... Now that he's actually starting to get to know the man, now that he's actually learning to appreciate some of the traits he'd found himself despising at first, he can't help but feel a hot flare of empathy at the thought of how hard losing that many people must have been on him. 

In hindsight – and Rush knows there's no use in even contemplating things like this – but in hindsight, he wishes he'd given Young the benefit of the doubt when they'd met back on Icarus. He'd been furious, filled with disdain at the idea of a man rejecting to be a physical part of the discovery of one of the greatest mysteries of the universe. That disdain had turned into heated contempt when he'd figured out Young was cheating on his wife with one of his subordinates, a woman twenty years his junior, someone _under his command_. 

Not wanting to lead the mission because one wanted to get back to their wife on Earth – while evidence of the kind of small-mindedness Rush has always hated in other people – was at least halfway defensible. Rush could appreciate the sanctity of marriage. Or rather, the sanctity of love. But Young's relationship with his wife had obviously not meant that much to him, or else he wouldn't have cheated on her. 

No, Rush had realized pretty early on that Young was a complete waste of space, and it had irritated the fuck out of him that he had to get Young's approval for things the man didn't even have the capacity to understand, let alone support. 

Now, though, knowing what he knows – knowing Young took to Destiny's mission with a kind of eagerness that Rush recognizes in no one but himself – he realizes he may have misjudged Young, and he wonders how different things could've gone if he'd been a bit more patient, a bit less abrasive, perhaps. 

It's no use, of course. 

And they're finding their way now, finally. Despite a number of false starts. 

Things have been going surprisingly smoothly since coming out of stasis. Young looks to him for advice. Listens to his suggestions. They're both more willing to give, and the ease with which they cooperate when it comes to the good of the ship and the crew might just be rippling over into his personal feelings for the colonel. Because right now he doesn't even consider if or how he could use the newfound knowledge of Young's nightmares to his own advantage. Right now all he cares about is that he's found a new piece to the puzzle that is Everett Young.

He nods in acknowledgment of Young's confession, and makes his own in return. “Me too.”

It's not meant as an invitation to discuss the nightmares in more detail, and thankfully Young doesn't take it as one. He merely dips his head and looks down at his hands again. 

Eventually, Young rolls the canteen into one hand and drags the other one through his hair. He looks up at Rush, a mild expression on his face, and Rush can't help but think he looks almost breathtaking, like that. Like a mountain – rough hewn and solid; easy to underestimate but tricky to navigate. The idea that Rush _is_ , that he's learning to navigate Young, fills him with a disproportionate sense of joyful pride.

“This helped,” Young says to him, and when Rush looks down at Young's watch he realizes they've been sitting here for nearly an hour already. 

“Yeah,” he answers, because it's the truth. He doesn't dread going back to sleep right now. He's glad he could do the same for Young, and he feels his expression soften as he takes in every single one of Young's facial features separately, and then adjusts his focus to take in the whole again. 

“I come here often, when I can't sleep,” he says, and he doesn't know exactly why he says it, but he knows that he means it to be an invitation, of sorts. 

Young's mouth quirks up into a smile – and even if it's small, this one is not unhappy at all – and says, “I'll keep that in mind,” before getting up from the bench. 

Young offers him a hand to get up, and Rush rolls his eyes but takes it anyway. Young's hand is cooler than he'd expected. His skin is just a hint rough, and the strength in his fingers... well, he's familiar with that strength, isn't he? But those memories feel faded and faraway, and Rush can't pretend that they're the reason why his heart thumps a little more insistently against his ribcage. 

When they're both standing, Young lets his hand slip out of Rush's grasp, and Rush ignores the urge to hold on tighter. It's irrational, to crave physical contact like this. Especially from Young. 

Still, when they walk out of the observation deck together, Rush allows his fingers to bump against the back of Young's hand before they part ways. 

-

It becomes something they do. A ritual, almost. 

Once, twice a week, they meet up in the observation deck. Privately, in the dead of night, they'll share a drink. For whatever reason, it makes the nightmares about the Nakai all but disappear.

Rush takes to collecting his rations from Brody's still – something he never used to do – and carrying his canteen on his late night forays to the observation deck. Usually Young brings the alcohol, but when rations are low, or on the single occasion he forgets his canteen, they drink from Rush's stash.

He doesn't touch his own canteen when Young brings his, and part of him is painfully aware that he enjoys the act of _sharing_ more than he cares to admit. Sharing canteens with Young. Handing it back and forth. Unthinkingly exchanging spit with each other. There's something thrilling about it, and Young doesn't seem inclined to call him on it, so he continues indulging himself.

Sometimes they talk about their day – life on the ship, or near-misses on a planet, or very rarely, Earth. Some nights, they barely exchange a word at all. For how difficult their communication has been since the moment they set foot aboard the ship, these late night get-togethers are easy – the boundaries between them blurred by alcohol and physical proximity. 

Soon, Rush finds himself looking forward to it. 

Sometimes he gets the urge to stand too close to Young on the bridge, to scoot up next to him in the mess, even during the day. He ignores it, usually. Pushes it down until it goes away. But after the first few weeks, he no longer stops his hand from wandering below his waistline when he lies in bed after their talks, head fuzzy with drink and images. He thinks about Young as he touches himself, replaying the assortment of smiles he's seen from the man; the robust feel of Young's shoulder against his own; the brush of his fingers against Rush's as they pass the canteen between them. 

It's a form of release, a way to deal with the stresses aboard Destiny, and it hardly seems like denying himself this harmless, physical pleasure is worth the struggle. He swipes his thumb across the head of his cock and imagines it's Young stroking him, talking at him with a voice that gets rougher as he gets closer, until the desire crests and his climax spills onto his belly. He wipes himself off with a rag, and closes his eyes.

This too, doesn't matter. This too, no one will ever find out.


	2. Chapter 2

He doesn't intend to let it go any further than that. 

He can deal with this, with this one-sided physical attraction. He isn't looking for more. He doesn't want to have a relationship with Young, or any such nonsense. And he's not resentful of the way he sees Young hug Lieutenant Johansen one day, of the way he closes his eyes and kisses her cheek like she is the most precious thing in the world to him. It is clearly a private moment, one he isn't supposed to witness, and aside from the rather distasteful idea of fraternization, Rush doesn't have an opinion about it. He certainly doesn't feel jealous. 

So he's not quite sure why he asks. 

“What is your relationship with Lieutenant Johansen?” 

Young gives him a long look, brow furrowed, as he leans away from Rush. Rush watches him in the reflection of the window, sacrificing the minute details of Young's expression in favor of slightly more self-protection, slightly better shielding against Young's piercing gaze. 

“I didn't think there was anyone on the ship who didn't know,” Young says, without discernible inflection. Rush thinks he's irritated by the question, though, and the fact that Young hasn't left or deflected makes him feel vaguely proud, somehow. 

The answer, however, uninformative as it is, makes something slither uncomfortably in his lower belly. “You're together?” 

Young's frown deepens, and Rush thinks there's something confused about the way he cocks his head at Rush. 

“Why do you ask that?” 

Rush takes a large pull of the canteen – liquid courage better than none – and turns to meet Young's gaze. “I think I saw something I wasn't supposed to see, yesterday,” he admits. 

Young studies his face for a second, then looks down to take the canteen from Rush's hands. Rush doesn't acknowledge the way his skin tingles where Young's fingers touch him. He _does_ , however, look avidly at the way Young closes his eyes and throws his head back to take a deep pull of the liquor. The little dance his Adam's apple does when he swallows is hypnotizing, and Rush knows that will play over and over in his mind's eye when he's alone again, tonight. 

“That wasn't...” Young says, looking out the window as he slowly rolls the canteen between his hands. “She told me something big. It was more of a goodbye, really.” 

Oh. 

Maybe he's been lying to himself, because the amount of relief that floods his system right now is slightly dizzying. Lieutenant Johansen is a beautiful woman; kind and young and warm and everything that Rush is not. The idea of competing with her over Young's affections would be both ridiculous and disheartening. 

“Why? Are you interested?” Young says, and Rush is shocked enough to look up into his face, to see the small, crooked smile, and the twinkle in Young's eyes. 

“What?” he stutters out, and then hates himself for how panicked he sounds. 

Young's eyebrows rise, and then his face softens a little bit. “Oh.” He checks his shoulder against Rush's in a way that feels sort of apologetic. “She's seeing someone.” 

Rush almost huffs out the breath he'd been holding. 

“Give me that,” he says instead, reaching over Young's hand to grab the canteen from him. He pretends he can taste Young as he puts the rim against his lips and drinks, and fuck, he's starting to tread into dangerous territory here. 

He's not sure he cares. 

Young is looking at him, a strange expression on his face. He seems hesitant about what he wants to say next, and Rush contemplates what would happen if he kissed Young right now. If he just pulled his face closer and pressed their lips together, would Young pull away? Would he get angry? Would he reciprocate? A quick thrill of desire shoots through him at the thought of Young kissing him back, of Young throwing him to the floor and just fucking him right here in the observation deck.

“Is it serious?” Young asks, and for a second Rush has no idea what he's talking about. 

Oh. He shakes his head, to clear the hazy fog of alcohol from his mind as much as to communicate that no, his feelings for Lieutenant Johansen are not serious. 

“We're stuck in close quarters, with a population of less than seventy people. Some inappropriate attraction is probably inescapable.” 

Young huffs out a breath. “Yeah, you can say that again.” It seems both amused and a little wistful. Still mourning over the loss of his relationship with Lieutenant Johansen, it seems. 

Rush feels an irrational surge of jealousy; he doesn't want Young to think about her, he wants Young to think about _him_. 

He reaches out for Young's hand, then, slowly turns it palm up and opens his fingers so he can slide the canteen into it. It's a bit more touch than they're used to, and it feels a bit too tender to be okay, but Young doesn't complain, and Rush thinks he gets away with it. 

“Colonel...” he says, not sure what he wants to follow it up with. 

Young's face is serious but kind, and again Rush feels the urge to yank him forward, to lick into his mouth and _taste_ him, for real. The blurry haze of the alcohol makes it harder to come up with all the reasons why that is a bad idea. 

“I think I'm going to bed,” he says, abruptly standing up from the bench. He's a bit unsteady on his feet, and Young looks at him for a moment before screwing the lid back onto the canteen and standing up, as well. 

“Yeah, okay. Let's go.” 

They walk through the empty corridors side by side. It takes him longer than it should to realize that Young is escorting him to his quarters. He snorts out a laugh, and feels something warm and happy unfurl in his chest. 

“What?” Young asks, a small smile playing at the corner of his mouth, and God, Rush just wants to push him up against the wall and... _everything_. He wants to do everything. 

“It's somewhat darling of you to chaperon me,” he answers instead, and feels his own lips quirk into a smile at the quiet laugh Young lets out. 

“Yeah, I'm a regular white knight.” 

Rush stumbles, mostly on purpose, and reaches out an arm to the wall to keep his balance. 

“Alright, come here,” Young says, and Rush feels giddy with satisfaction when Young wraps his arm around his shoulders for support. It feels both dangerous and right to curl his own arm around the small of Young's back, and the sturdy warmth beneath his fingertips makes him feel strangely adventurous.

“I'm not drunk,” he says, turning slightly into the crook of Young's neck as they slowly make their way through the metal hallways. He can smell Young – a warm, dry, almost spicy scent that makes his cock stir with interest. 

“Of course you're not,” Young says amiably. “We're almost there.” 

They stop in front of his door, and Rush feels loath to let go of Young. He presses the door control with his free hand, and lets Young untangle his arm and step slightly aside. 

“I would've made it here by myself, you know,” Rush says, not wanting to say goodnight yet. 

“I'm sure you'd have found your way here eventually,” Young answers with an amused expression. 

Rush huffs out a breath. He drags his hand through his hair. “...Well.”

Young's eyes search his face, and Rush feels his skin heat up when Young's expression turns somewhat teasing. “I think the word you're looking for is 'goodnight'.” 

“Right. Unless you were hoping for me to invite you in, of course,” he says, praying his expression comes off as a mischievous smirk rather than a maniacal grin. 

Young raises an eyebrow at him and lets the corner of his mouth curl up. “Maybe some other time, Rush,” he says, and Rush isn't sure if that low rumble in his voice is meant to be playful or if that's just Young's voice, but either way it takes everything he has not to push Young up against the wall and wrestle him to his knees right there. 

Rush cocks his head and runs his tongue against his left incisor. He wants to say something, up the ante, but he's pretty sure he's about to cross the line if he doesn't shut up now. Young sends him a curious look. 

“Goodnight, Colonel,” he says, feeling disappointed and relieved at the same time. At least he will still be able to look Young in the eye tomorrow morning. 

“Night, Rush,” Young answers, and then they part ways. 

Half an hour later, Rush fucks himself on his own fingers for the first time. 

If he moans Young's name when he comes all over the sheets, it doesn't really matter. No one will ever find out. 

-

Naturally, someone does find out. 

He's in one of the new sections they've opened up, a large room filled with machines and equipment with as of yet undetermined functions. Rush suspects this may have been intended to be the actual infirmary; Lieutenant Johansen's space seems like a first aid tent at a festival compared to this room. 

He's studying one of the machines; it consists of a large monitor, a control panel, and a glove-like harness. Curious, he takes the harness and slides it over his hand. The size fits well, even if it is maybe a little on the large side. Young's hand would fit into it better. Young's hands are slightly large for his frame, and lately, Rush has found himself paying too much attention to them. The way Young moves them, restrained, economical, yet somehow radiating strength... it's oddly pleasing to watch. 

Suddenly the monitor springs to life, and right there on the screen Rush sees Young's hands. The picture is overlaid by an image of the machine itself, and in the corner of the monitor something flashes, like a warning. 

Fuck, what's going on? Is the machine reading his mind? The flashing in the corner gets brighter and takes on a red hue, and that has to be his growing alarm, because he's trying to get the harness off but it won't budge, and he _can't_ have his thoughts projected onto a huge screen like this. 

“What are you doing?” Volker asks, and _fuck_. Volker's face appears on the monitor, in the middle of the flashing red warning, and he really can't think about Young right now, so of course his mind conjures up an image of the Colonel closing his lips around the canteen and swallowing, _fuck_. There's no way to deny that it's sexual, the way it's projected on the screen, and Volker cuts himself off mid-question when he realizes it.

“Is that Col— uh.”

Rush is really starting to panic now. Most of the monitor has taken on a deep, throbbing red hue, and he tries desperately to focus on anything, _anything at all_ , that isn't the thought of what he does to himself when he's alone in his room after drinking with Young. He realizes that he fails when it's there, right on the screen, overlaying the industrial shipyards in Glasgow, a picture of the field of dandelions where he broke his arm as a child, and an image of that goddamn harness clawing into his skin and tearing his hand to bloody pieces.

Finally he manages to pull it off, to break through whatever safety mechanism is on there with brute force, and he pulls in a shaky breath when the monitor darkens. Fuck. _Fuck_.

Volker is looking at him with eyes the size of saucers, hands raised slightly in defense. “I won't... I won't tell anyone,” he says, and Rush knows he won't, and he can't even find the capacity to be grateful for that, because fucking _Volker_ found out, and this is goddamn horrifying. 

Rush has half a mind to force Volker into wearing the glove himself, to collect some blackmail material of his own, but instead he yells at Volker to get the fuck out _right now_. He leans back against the machine, a fist balled against his forehead. 

_Fuck_.


	3. Chapter 3

“We need to talk,” Rush says as he barges into Volker's private quarters. It's one of the small rooms, similar to his own, and he'd had to ask Brody for directions because he's never even been in this part of Destiny before. 

Volker looks like a deer caught in headlights, frozen and vaguely terrified for his life. “I—” he lets out a sigh and turns to face Rush completely. “Alright, fine.” 

“What you saw...” 

“I barely know what I saw!” Volker says, but Rush interrupts him. 

“What you _saw_ , was nothing more than idle think, Doctor Volker. It was subconscious and private, and we will never speak of it again.” 

Volker has the audacity to roll his eyes. “I already said I wouldn't tell anyone.” 

“Good.” Rush turns around to leave, when Volker speaks again. 

“You should tell him, though. Colonel Young.” 

He freezes, hand hanging uselessly in front of the door control. 

“I think he'd want to know,” Volker says. 

“It's none of your business,” Rush hisses, and then he's out of the room. 

If there's anything he can take away from this whole debacle, it's that he should stop this. He should stop meeting with Young late at night. He should stop drinking with Young. He should stop thinking about Young. And he should _definitely_ stop getting himself off to thoughts of Young. 

He should stop this altogether.

-

It's nearly a week before Young calls him on it, and Rush feels an odd combination of satisfaction and irritation when Young corners him in a hallway and asks him what's wrong. 

“Care to be a bit more specific?” he bites out, and Young gives him one of those looks that makes Rush want to fist his fingers in his military jacket, to rip it open and shove it out of the way so he can mouth a trail of sucking kisses down the length of his throat – and _fuck_. He wasn't supposed to have these thoughts anymore. 

“You haven't been to the observation deck,” Young says, and although Rush wants to play dumb, he knows they both know what Young means. 

“I wasn't aware I was under any obligation, Colonel.” 

Young looks unhappy for a moment, confused and maybe even a little bit hurt, and Rush bites the inside of his cheek and angles his gaze away. 

“Fine. Forget I asked,” Young says, and then he's walking away from Rush. And that feeling washing over him, that's somewhere between guilt and loss. 

Rush doesn't like it. 

-

“It's beautiful,” Chloe says, her eyes wide. 

The planet _is_ beautiful. It's freezing, literally, and everything is covered in at least half a meter of pristine, searing white snow. A thin flurry of individual flakes dances over its surface, creating an almost magical display. Rush wishes he could pay it more attention - appreciate it for its uncomplicated beauty, if nothing more - but his thoughts get stuck on Young, who is standing in front of him, deciding on how they should carry out this mission. 

Christ, he just wants to worm his hands underneath Young's jacket and shirt, to warm his fingers up against Young's dry skin, to smooth his palms over Young's chest until they are both shivering with something other than the biting cold. He averts his eyes and focuses instead on Lieutenant Scott, who is digging a trench in the snow and then prying bits of the frozen earth out for testing. 

Scott shakes his head, negative, and says, “Guess that would've been too convenient.” 

Rush casts his eyes over the landscape. His fingers already feel cold, despite the thick gloves. It's going to be a long day. 

“We've got twelve hours, people,” Young says, raising his voice slightly to be heard over the howling wind. “Scott, Greer, take Chloe and Brody; you go that way. The rest, with me.” 

They're looking for a mineral compound, this time. They need it to fix a number of the power conductors on board, and there's a good chance it'll be found in soil that is rich in vegetation, which seems... unlikely to be easy, given how everything is buried beneath an arm-length of snow.

Young leads them in the opposite direction of the other team. Eli makes the occasional quip about inane science fiction movies, and seems exasperatedly offended when no one reacts. Rush just tries to keep his head empty of thoughts, to ignore the set of Young's shoulders under his heavy backpack, or the way his boots crunch through the snow. 

They walk for nearly an hour and a half to reach something resembling a frozen forest. The trees look more like bamboo stalks, or upright pine needles, tall and slim and oddly smooth. Testing the soil doesn't bring up anything they need, once again. 

“This is taking too long,” Eli says. “I already can't feel my fingers anymore.” 

Young frowns, and looks out over the forest. “Fine, we're splitting up to cover more ground.” 

“Yes, sir,” Barnes says, and Rush has the sinking sensation that Young isn't going to put him on her team, but instead intends for the two of them to trudge through the snow together. Alone. 

He doesn't want that; it's hard enough to keep his attention away from the colonel when there are two other people with them. Still, he doesn't speak up, and when Young is pondering who to assign to his own team, it's possible Rush makes the smallest movement towards him. Young sends him a challenging stare before turning to Barnes. 

“Barnes, you take Eli. Head back to the gate in four hours tops; I don't want to risk anyone getting frostbite.” 

They part ways, and Rush awkwardly hoists his backpack up higher on his shoulders as he moves to follow behind Young. 

They don't speak. They stop every twenty minutes to dig into the thick snow and test crumbs of frozen dirt, but so far they have nothing. Rush cracks his neck and barely contains a sigh. He isn't sure whether it is genuinely getting colder and windier, or whether the snow planet and the uncomfortable silence are just wearing him down. 

It isn't until they find the entrance to a cave that Rush speaks up. “We should test the soil in there.” 

“Why? We need vegetation rich soil, right?” 

“There could be something growing in there.” He also kind of wants to get out of the icy wind for a little while, because by now he's quite certain it's not just him; the weather really is worsening. 

Young acquiesces, and they trudge through the snow and over a few icy patches until they're at the mouth of the cave. Young rummages around in his backpack for a second – the thick gloves making his movements unusually clumsy – and extracts a flashlight. 

“Wait here,” Young says, and Rush rolls his eyes behind Young's back as the man goes inside the cave. 

Less than a minute later, Young emerges. “You should check this out.” 

The inside of the cave is warmer, moreso than can be explained by the lack of icy wind. 

“I think it's coming from this stuff,” Young says, as he lets his flashlight shine on the dark purple moss-like vegetation that covers the inside walls of the cave. Rush steps closer, and indeed, it seems the moss emits a low-grade heat. It's fascinating, but right now Rush is more interested in the practical nature of it, because fuck, he's freezing. 

They move deeper into the cave; it's not small, but it doesn't appear to be very deep either. Young's flashlight illuminates even into its furthest reaches, and it doesn't seem to be more than about a fifteen meter deep hole in the rock. 

Outside the mouth of the cave, a sudden gust of wind flares, and an eerie sound plays through the echoing cavern. 

“We should test the soil here,” Rush says, and Young hands him the flashlight before reaching into his backpack to search for the testing equipment. 

Rush stays close to the wall, and contemplates taking off his gloves to bury his fingers in the warm moss. His hands are freezing. Still, they have no way of determining whether the moss is safe to touch. For all they know it might be poisonous, and Rush does _not_ want to get stuck in this cave with some type of reaction. The gate is at least three hours out from where they are, and it will be challenging enough to make it back without being sick on top of that. 

“It's positive,” Young says from a few meters away. He clicks on his radio and informs the others that they've found the soil they need. “I'll send you our coordinates over the kino remote.” 

Again, a strong current of wind blows past the opening of the cave, and the cold reaches all the way to where Rush is standing. He shivers. Outside, he can see snowflakes falling, and it hadn't been snowing before, had it? 

“We need to hurry up, the weather's getting worse,” Rush says, just as Young's radio crackles to life again. 

_“Sir, it looks like we're about to be hit by an icestorm,”_ Scott says. _“Permission to drop the civilians off at the gate first?”_

“Of course, Lieutenant. We're good here. The vegetation seems to be giving off heat. Don't take any unnecessary risks.” 

_“Understood. Scott out.”_

“So,” Young says, as he turns back to Rush. “We should probably get to digging, then.” 

Rush makes a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat, but opens his backpack to search for his makeshift trowel. 

They need about a hundred kilograms of the stuff, and it takes them nearly thirty minutes to dig out enough of the soil. It's lucky the earth isn't frozen solid, but even so, the ground is hard and it takes effort to collect the amount they need. When they're done, they stare at the small hill of dirt for a few moments. They can't do much more than leave it in a loose pile, but at least it will be easily shoveled onto a kino sled this way. 

The digging has made Rush work up a sweat, and he shivers again when a freezing gust of air makes its way inside through the mouth of the cave. Fuck, despite the heat the moss gives off, it still can't be more than a few degrees Celsius above freezing. A glance cast outside shows him that either the snowflakes have gotten very thick and heavy, or it's something closer to hail that's falling. 

He swivels his head back when Young's radio goes off again. 

_“Sir, we've just found Eli and Barnes. I think Barnes has hypothermia. She might also have frostbite, I'm not sure.”_

Young frowns and sends Rush a small glance. 

“Copy that, Scott. Get them back to the ship, that's your main priority. Do not split up.” 

_“Understood. We'll come for you as soon as possible.”_

“Good. Bring a kino sled, Lieutenant.” 

_“Yes, sir.”_

“Well, this is turning into another fantastically effective mission, Colonel,” Rush says with an unimpressed twitch of his eyebrow. It's probably not smart to nettle Young like this right now, but he's cold and annoyed and sexually frustrated, and he honestly doesn't give a fuck. 

Young just gives him a look and sighs. “Shut up, Rush.” 

Rush grabs his canteen of tea and takes a drink. It's lukewarm, so it does little to warm him up, but at least it's not cold. He can barely feel his fingers anymore, though, and it takes him longer than it should to screw the cap back onto his canteen. 

Young regards him silently, then digs his own bottle out of his backpack. 

Rush feels the slightest bit lightheaded, and he wonders if it's the cold that's getting to him, or the lack of sleep, or just Young's proximity. God, these past two weeks he has kept Young firmly out of his thoughts whenever he was alone in his quarters, but it's physically impossible not to let his mind wander when the man is mere meters away, and they're stuck together in a cave. 

It's increasingly difficult not to come up with fantasy scenarios in which they end up fucking the cold away, and it's increasingly _irritating_ that his mind insists on shoving them in his face every other minute or so. 

Young glances over at him often, but Rush refuses to speak a single word while they wait. It's almost thirty minutes before Young's radio chimes again. 

_“Greer and I are on our way, now,”_ Scott says. _“Visibility is about 10%, though, so I'm not sure how long it'll take us to reach you, sir.”_

“Negative, Scott. Get back to the ship. We'll wait out the storm here, and make contact when you drop out of FTL again.” 

_“Sir...”_

“That is an order, Lieutenant. We'll be fine here. We'll see you in a couple of hours, hopefully the storm will have died down by then.” 

_“Roger that, sir. Stay safe.”_

“Alright. Young out.” 

The silence hangs awkwardly between them, and Young sends him a halfway apologetic stare before digging around in his pack and coming up with a ration bar. He eats half of it, and offers the other half to Rush. 

Rush takes it, on instinct more than because he actually wants to eat right now, and watches mutely as Young sits down carefully against the moss-covered wall. 

He takes a halfhearted bite of the ration bar, and chews with a frown. He finds he _is_ hungry, after all, and finishes the rest of the bar within a minute. 

“What are you doing?” he asks Young, gesturing at where the man has sat down. 

Young shrugs. “There's not much we can do but wait.” 

Rush sighs, crumpling up the empty wrapper and stuffing it into his bag. He supposes Young is right. 

The storm rages on outside, and Rush can feel every icy gust that blows into the cave all the way to his bones. 

He starts shivering. At first it's just the occasional tremble, but soon he's shivering involuntarily, and no matter how often he tries to slow his breathing, to calm his muscles, he can't seem to stop it. 

“You're shaking,” Young says, and it doesn't sound admonishing, even though his facial expression says it's meant to be. “Come here.” 

Rush doesn't even pretend to fight it. He sits down inside the hollow between Young's legs, and when Young says, “Put your hands in my sleeves,” he allows the man to peel off his gloves and worms his hands into Young's sleeves without question. 

“We don't know whether that moss is poisonous,” he says to Young. 

“I'm not touching it with my skin.” 

Rush lets his head fall backwards, then, into the crook of Young's neck. His hands are slowly warming up, and his fingers tingle unpleasantly, but he can feel again. The skin beneath his hands is warm, and soft, and when he squeezes he can feel the muscle underneath. It's better, like this. Warmer. 

“Rush,” Young murmurs after a while, and Rush can feel his breath tickle against his cheek. “Why did you stop coming to the observation deck?” 

And it's hard to come up with a feasible answer right then. To deflect, or to lie, or to go on the offensive. So he stays quiet and discreetly nuzzles into the skin of Young's neck. He can barely smell anything with the icy air all around him, but he still imagines he can smell Young. The thought sends an aroused shudder down his spine, and that's how he realizes his shivering has stopped. 

He's warming up, and perhaps that means he should move away. Instead, he lets his lips brush against the skin of Young's neck and pretends it's accidental. 

Young sighs, and he feels the minute movement in the delicate skin under his lips. 

“Don't fall asleep,” Young says. Rush twists his hands inside Young's sleeves until the backs of his fingers are pressed against the warm skin on the inside of Young's elbows. 

“'M not.”

He feels a small shudder go through Young, then, and presses his back a little more heavily into Young's chest. This is nice. It's so nice that right now he can't even really remember why he stopped meeting up with Young, because even a fraction of this should be worth any discomfort. 

“Rush,” Young says again, and his voice sounds slow and faraway. “Did you stop shivering because you're warming up, or because you're too cold?” 

He hums a little in answer, and Young jostles him lightly with his leg. 

“Talk to me, Rush.” 

“Warming up,” he says against the skin of Young's throat, and he's so tempted to flick his tongue out and lick, _taste_ , even though that would be the worst idea in this cold. 

Young lets out a hard breath, and turns his face to let his temple rest against Rush's head. 

“Just a couple more hours. We'll be fine.” 

“Feels good,” he says into Young's skin, and his eyes snap open. He hadn't meant to say that out loud. He still feels slightly drunk, and it's only now that he thinks maybe it's more than just the cold and Young's proximity. 

“Yeah,” Young answers quietly, and Rush feels his arms tighten around him the slightest bit. “'S feels really good.” 

“...Colonel,” he says, turning his head slightly away from Young's neck, because God, his mouth is watering at the idea of kissing, biting, sucking at the sensitive flesh there. He's already forgotten what he wanted to say, though, even if he's quite certain it was important. 

“I miss you,” Young says earnestly. 

“I'm right here,” Rush replies, instead of snapping at Young to stop spouting nonsense. His eyes keep slipping shut. He's so sleepy. 

“Feel like you dumped me,” Young says, and he sounds miserable. He freezes for a second, before stirring slightly. “Something isn't right.” 

Rush yawns and rolls his head back into the crook of Young's neck. 

“I want...” he says, and then presses his lips against Young's throat. Yeah. He wants that. 

“Did you just kiss me?” Young asks, and he sounds as drowsy as Rush feels. 

“It's the moss,” Rush slurs, not bothering to deny it. His eyes blink closed slowly. 

Young groans, and Rush barely feels the slight twitch against his back. “We have to move.” It doesn't sound very convincing, and Rush doesn't do much more than hum in reply. 

The last thing he feels is Young resting his cheek against the top of his head.


	4. Chapter 4

“What the hell? Colonel Young! Rush!” 

Rush groans and blinks his eyes open. That's Lieutenant Scott's voice, and he's plucking at him with a wild, almost panicky speed. 

“Don't touch me,” he mumbles, but he doesn't have the strength to even move away. 

“Help me get this stuff off of them,” he hears Scott say, and then there are more hands touching him, pulling at him, or his clothes, and he can barely get out more than an offended whine before he falls asleep again. 

-

“Doctor Rush?” Lieutenant Johansen's voice is soft and melodic, but it grates. Not as much as the overly bright light she's shining directly into his eyes, however. 

“'S going on?” he asks, flinching away from her hand on his forehead and her damned penlight. 

“Scott and his team found you on the planet. You were unconscious and covered in some sort of plant. We have no idea what it was, but it appeared to, uh. To be carnivorous.” 

It's as if his brain is coming online one partition at a time, and he feels himself frowning at her explanation. He remembers the cave, remembers feeling mellow and lightheaded, remembers... shite, he remembers leaning into Young's warmth, feeling his skin underneath his lips. He remembers kissing Young, _and Young had noticed_. 

“You have some abrasions on your face and neck, in the places where the plant touched your skin. It looks like it used a corrosive agent to feed itself. You're lucky they found you in time; everything should heal fine.” 

“What about Young?” 

Her face does something he doesn't quite know how to interpret. 

“He's a bit worse off. The colonel's wounds are deeper, and he hasn't woken up, yet. He was pretty much covered in the stuff when we found you.” 

Fuck. That's worry, contracting and scattering aimlessly in the back of his mind, making him feel jittery and unnerved. 

“I want to see him,” he says, before he has the wherewithal to censure himself. 

Johansen frowns, and then nods over at the bed on his other side. “He's right there.” 

Rush turns, too quickly, and his head spins and something pinches painfully at the back of his neck, but it doesn't matter. Young looks... God, he looks like absolute shit. Over half of his face is covered in deep scrapes, dark red and still slightly sticky in appearance. His eyes are closed, and his breathing is deep and even. If Rush tries, he can almost imagine Young is just sleeping. 

“How long?” he croaks. 

“A few hours,” Lieutenant Johansen answers. “It's not a coma.” 

Good, that makes him feel better. Rush stifles a yawn; he's still exhausted. 

He keeps his eyes trained on Young. Vaguely, he hears Johansen get up and leave, and an undetermined amount of time passes (eleven of Young's breaths, he can measure time in that), before she's back. 

“Drink,” she orders him, and he reluctantly accepts the bottle of water she's pushing into his hands. 

“He'll be okay,” she says, and he's not sure if it's meant to reassure him, or herself, or both, but for some reason it actually works. He takes a deep swallow of the water and barely has the mental capacity to screw the lid back on before he falls asleep again. 

-

The next time he wakes up, Lieutenant Johansen is tending to Young. He hears her low murmur and his ragged groan, and peeks through his lashes at the scene in front of him. God, he's tired, and that must be an after-effect from the moss, because he probably slept more since entering that cave than he has in weeks. 

It's not that he's relieved that Young is awake. Honestly. It couldn't matter to him less. 

Still, his heartbeat jumps up unnecessarily when he hears Young's strained voice utter his name. 

“He's fine. He's sleeping,” Johansen says, and bends forward to dab a layer of some sort of gelatinous ointment on the open wounds on Young's face. “He's got a few scrapes and he'll probably have a headache, but that's about it.” 

Rush can only make out a small piece of Young's forehead, because Johansen's body is in the way, but Young must make a face or something when her gloved fingers spread the gel-like substance on one of the open wounds, because she mutters, “Sorry.”

Time still feels like it's passing in sluggish dribbles and racing spurts, and Rush isn't sure how long he lies there, staring at the glistening red abrasion on Young's forehead. Suddenly Lieutenant Johansen gets up from her stool and he's looking at Young, and Young is looking back at him, and everything but the thrumming sound of his blood rushing through his veins fades to the background. 

Fuck, he _cares_. He cares about Young, because that's relief flowing through his chest, and a sympathetic ache pulsing under his fingertips, and quiet longing settling in his heart. Young's eyes are dark and warm, and he doesn't hear him say “Hey,” over the roaring in his ears, but he sees it. The deep lacerations going all the way down Young's cheek to past his chin probably look worse than they are, but Rush feels his heartbeat pick up anyway, because only now is he starting to realize that they would have died if they hadn't been found. Only now is he starting to realize that _Young_ would have died, and that would have been a very fucking terrible thing. 

Lieutenant Johansen sits down in front of him and cuts off his view, offering a welcome distraction from his inner turmoil over Young. 

“Doctor Rush,” she says calmly. “How're you feeling?” 

For an agonizing second, he doesn't know how to answer that. “...Fine.”

He has a quiet moment of panic while she applies the gel on his own scrapes, because he'd made his peace with the physical attraction – that was something he had no control over, something he could attribute to prolonged close proximity and lack of physical stimulation and perhaps even a deeply misguided survival instinct – but _feelings_ , that's an entirely different matter. He rarely ever has romantic feelings, and when he has in the past it's always been for remarkable people – brilliant and kind and _special_. Young isn't any of those things. 

Johansen gets up and walks around his bed, and he's faced with Young's gaze again. His eyes are focused and concerned, despite the exhaustion radiating off him, and Rush feels his chest clench tightly. 

Perhaps he was too abrupt in his assessment of Young just now, because there's no denying that the man _is_ kind. Maybe it took Rush a while to recognize it, because Young's brand of kindness is not something he'd ever experienced before. It's brusque and unexpected and most times Young tries to show it to Rush he looks as uncomfortable as Rush feels. But he recognizes it now, and it spreads a warm feeling through his chest. And the way Young manages to collect people around him, the way he somehow went from unwillingly being thrust into the position of the ship's commanding officer to becoming the foundation upon which the crew – perhaps even the mission itself – is anchored, that's a form of brilliance that Rush never quite managed to master himself. Maybe this, the fact that Rush is becoming emotionally invested, is confirmation that Young _is_ special. 

Christ, he's justifying this... this _thing_ he has for Young, and it doesn't even matter, because obviously Young isn't going to feel the same way. The man seems entirely straight, for all intents and purposes—but no, maybe he shouldn't make assumptions, because Young has a way of taking all his expectations and turning them on their ear, and he hadn't... he hadn't seemed upset when Rush kissed his neck. Granted, he'd been drugged by the moss, but he'd also said he missed Rush. 

He flinches when Lieutenant Johansen's fingers unexpectedly dab more of the cold substance on the abrasions on the back of his neck, and it jars him out of his own head. Young's eyes are still on him, a heavy weight that calms him as much as it makes him feel jittery with nerves. 

Part of him wants to ask if Young remembers. If the reason he didn't move away when Rush kissed him was because he was too compromised to do anything or because he liked it. Whether there is even the slightest chance that maybe he wants Rush, too. 

Instead, he observes quietly as Young's eyes slowly droop closed again. 

“He must've gotten a higher dose of whatever that plant used to sedate you,” Johansen says to him, when Young's fully asleep. She hands him his bottle of water again and tells him to drink. 

“I want to keep you under observation for a bit longer,” she says, and her tone makes it clear this isn't a request. He's not quite willing to leave just yet anyway, so he simply asks her for his laptop and lays his head back down on the pillow. 

He watches Young's sleeping face until Eli scampers into his line of sight and puts Rush's laptop on the side table. Eli casts a worried glance over at the colonel. 

“That looks painful,” he says with a slight grimace. Rush quietly concurs. 

“TJ says you'll both be out of here soon, though.” Eli looks over his shoulder and turns back to give Rush an awkward smile. “I should go see how Barnes is doing.” 

And then Rush is alone again, left to wonder what to do with his newfound feelings for Young – for the man who'd left him for dead and saved him from that watery hell. The man who'd unexpectedly turned from his biggest obstruction into his most important ally. The man who'd found a place for Rush in the ragtag group of family he'd gathered around himself on the ship. 

For the past two weeks he's been avoiding Young, and it has been less than ideal. But he isn't certain that pursuing an actual relationship with Young will be any better. There's a good chance Young will be uncomfortable with the knowledge that Rush wants him, and, much more importantly, telling Young how he feels will put Rush in quite a vulnerable position. If it was just about a physical attraction, maybe he could have brought himself to opening up a discussion. Maybe he could have proposed it to Young and the worst that might have happened would be Young declining the offer of sex. 

But it's not. It's about more – it's about _feelings_ now – and Rush curses himself for letting it get to this point. Because it's not that he can't build a rational case as to why wanting to be with Young makes sense. He can think of a number of reasons off the top of his head why getting together with Young might make his life easier aboard the ship. But he'd be lying to himself if he pretended that the state he's in right now was in any way planned or built on a foundation of rationality, and that... that irritates the fuck out of him. Hell, he _likes_ Young, and there's not a chance he's going to admit that the man has basically reduced him to a lovestruck teenager by virtue of nothing more than simply being there. It's embarrassing, is what it is. 

So no, perhaps having an honest conversation about this is not on the table. 

There has got to be another way he can approach this issue, though, because knowing what he knows, he won't be able to go back to ignoring Young. Even now it's difficult to take his eyes off Young's sleeping form, and they're in _public_ , for crying out loud. He's damn well aware of the way Lieutenant Johansen keeps shooting them both surreptitious little glances. 

Biting back a frustrated sigh, Rush grabs his laptop from the side table. He has work to do. Hopefully focusing on that for a while will clear his mind.

-

In the end, he never quite figures out how to broach the subject. 

Johansen releases him from the infirmary before dinner, and after a quick meal in the mess hall Rush retreats to his quarters. He's still tired, so after another fruitless session on his laptop, he gives it up and goes to bed. 

Young gets released the next day, as Rush finds out when the man shows up for his bridge shift at noon. His face still looks awful, but at least the wounds no longer have that slick sheen to them anymore. They're healing. 

“Hey,” Young greets him. “How're you feeling?” 

Rush gestures at Young's face. “Better than you, I'd say.” 

Young grunts out something resembling a laugh. “You do realize you look like you got into a fight with the sidewalk and lost, right?” 

Rush can't really argue with that; the entire left side of his face is covered in abrasions, and there's a big one on the back of his neck that protests painfully every time he turns his head too fast or too far. 

“Mine aren't as deep as yours,” he answers, and he's not sure if he's saying it to dispute Young's claim that they both look equally terrible, or to express his concern for Young.

Young's face is unreadable as he takes place in the command chair. 

“Volker, would you mind getting us some lunch?” Young asks suddenly, and Volker's eyes dart between them curiously a few times before he gets up from his station and complies. 

The moment Volker disappears into the corridor, Rush feels his heartbeat pick up. They're alone on the bridge now, and fuck if that doesn't sound like the set-up to a thousand scenarios in his mind. 

“So,” Young says. “You want to talk about it?” 

Rush keeps his eyes firmly fixed on his monitor and ignores the urge to turn around, to search Young's face for any clues as to how he feels about this. 

“Not particularly,” he answers, hoping his voice drawls lazily. 

“We, uh... we just gonna pretend nothing happened?”

“Well, that does sound like us, doesn't it?” 

Young huffs out a breath, and Rush is almost certain it's as much in annoyance as it is in amusement. It's not the first time he's heard that noise directed at him, and for some reason it fills him with a surge of affection for Young. 

It's quiet for a while, until Rush hears the rustle of Young's uniform as he moves in the chair. 

“Do you want to come to the observation deck tonight?” 

Rush feels a bit of the tension in his shoulders unfurl, and tamps down the little smile that wants to work its way up his face. Awkward and uncertain as the question may have sounded, Young is asking him... he's asking him for something Rush can't deny he wants. “That depends,” he says, turning around in his seat slowly. The scrape on the back of his neck still pinches angrily. “Are you bringing the drinks?” 

Young's face goes from that unreadable almost-frown into something more relaxed, and Rush feels something flutter low in his belly when Young's lips curl up a little. “Seems like a small price to pay.” 

Rush turns back to his console, resolutely ignoring the fact that he's quite sure he just consented to their equivalent of a date. 

Even if it's not – even if it's just sharing a drink and having a chat like they did before – he finds himself looking forward to it.


	5. Chapter 5

Young is already waiting for him when he makes it to the observation deck that night. He looks neat, composed – like he straightened his uniform and slicked his hair back with water before coming here – and Rush feels something in his lower belly contract nervously at that thought. 

It _is_ a date. 

“Hi,” Young says, when Rush enters his line of sight. 

“Hey,” he answers quietly, sitting down on the bench. 

The silence between them spreads like an oil spill, and it's loaded with words and questions from both of them, he's fairly certain. Rush looks at their reflections in the window, and they still look like two friends. Two friends who barely survived a car crash, perhaps, but two friends regardless. Suddenly Young looks up and their eyes catch in the reflection. The moment only lasts for a second or two, but Rush feels the breath stutter in his lungs. 

He has no idea where to go from here, if he's honest. 

Young hands him his canteen, and it makes an embarrassingly strong wave of relief wash over Rush. Perhaps they don't have to talk. Perhaps they can just sit here in silence and drink, and that will be enough. 

He takes a long drag of the harsh alcohol, before handing it back to Young. 

It feels both familiar and uncharted, what they're doing right now, and they're halfway through the contents of the canteen before either of them speaks. Rush isn't sure who moved – maybe it was him, maybe it was Young, maybe it was both of them – but they're touching now, shoulders and upper arms pressed against each other, and a warm point of contact where Young's knee is nestled right above Rush's own. Young has a tendency to sit with his legs spread, and Rush can't keep his eyes from following the line of the inside of Young's thigh all the way up to his groin – and God, he has never spent quite as much time wondering about another man's cock as he has with Young. Rush snaps his eyes away, and goes back to gazing at Young's reflection in the window. Perhaps the reason Young sits like this is a subconscious message that he'd like to welcome someone between his legs – that he's willing to be dominated if the right person came along... 

“We could,” he says, voice rough and a little louder than he'd intended. “We could go to my quarters.” 

Young looks up at him, and the slight ripple of discomfort on his face makes Rush feel queasy until he realizes it's because Young just aggravated the wounds on the back of his neck. Young's expression turns softer, and he reaches out for Rush's hand to wind his own fingers around it with a tenderness Rush isn't used to seeing from the man. It makes something flutter uncontrollably in his chest.

“I'd like that,” he says with a small smile. “But I think we need to heal a bit before we do anything.” 

“Anything,” Rush repeats, aiming for unimpressed. “Meaning?” 

Young's eyes darken and Rush feels his heartbeat spike, and then Young is leaning forward, kissing him with an odd mixture of control and desperation. He runs his tongue along the seam of Rush's lips, but he doesn't allow the kiss to go very deep. It's good. It's not enough, not nearly as much as he wants, but Young's mouth is soft and warm, and Rush thinks he can taste him beyond the sterile tang of the alcohol. 

Rush doesn't realize he has closed his eyes until Young pulls back and he opens them. 

“Anything more,” Young says, by way of explanation. 

Rush licks his lips and looks down at their entwined hands. 

It's different, inviting someone to spend the night knowing there won't be any sex. More intimate somehow, backwards as that sounds. But he won't deny that he likes the idea. 

“Okay,” he says, before getting up from the bench. He keeps his fingers clasped around Young's, and waits for the man to join him. 

Holding Young's hand makes him feel young again; happy and hopeful and more innocent than he knows either of them to be. So he doesn't let go. Chances of them running into anyone are low at this time of night, and besides, it's not like he cares what anyone else thinks of this. Not right now, anyway. The fact that Young doesn't pull away, that he seems to feel the same way about this, fills Rush with a contented glow. 

He palms open the door to his quarters and pulls Young inside, and before his door is even closed he curls his free hand into Young's hair. Careful not to exacerbate either of their scrapes, he angles his head forward to press another kiss into Young's mouth. 

Young's hand lands on his hip and travels up his back, slipping under his shirts easily, as their tongues slide together in a wet tangle of heat. He can tell Young deliberately tries to keep their pace slow and soft, and it makes him feel rebellious – it makes him want to take this further, to make it dirtier, just to see how far Young will let him go – but at the same time it's kind of nice, like this. And perhaps pushing Young like that isn't the best way to go right now. Perhaps he should try to give Young the leeway he hadn't afforded him the first time they met. 

Because some things are different, in this context. Less complex. Easier to accept. Maybe he doesn't have to fight tooth and nail for every last scrap of control here. 

Rush swallows and breaks the kiss. His fingers trace a circular pattern on Young's scalp. 

“Let's go to bed,” he breathes against Young's lips, walking him backwards until they're right beside the bed. Maybe Young doesn't want to take this any further than kissing, but the nights on the ship are cold and lonely, and Rush has fantasized about Young in his bed more times than he can count. And while he tried to keep himself from imagining Young here in non-sexual scenarios, he did not always succeed. So yeah, sleeping together - even if it's _just_ sleeping - is an enticing prospect.

Young gives him a complicated look, like he hasn't decided how to react to this yet. 

They stand there, both seemingly waiting for a signal as to what's coming next. “You don't really care about us healing first, do you?” Rush asks, more because he's curious than because he wants to convince Young to change his mind. Young gives him a smile that seems almost embarrassed, and casts his eyes to the side. It's oddly precious, and Rush only resists the urge to kiss him again because he wants to hear his answer. 

“Not really, no.” 

Seeing as only yesterday they were mauled by predatory alien moss, having sex right right now would be uncomfortable and medically a bad idea, probably. But it's not like that's ever stopped them from doing anything to each other before. They don't exactly have a strong track record of responsible choices to their names. Especially not when it comes to each other. 

“What, then?” Rush asks. 

This time Young leans forward and draws him in for a short kiss. It's little more than a brushing of lips, but it makes something ache deep in Rush's chest. 

“I want to take this slow,” Young says, like he's admitting something big. Perhaps he is. “Do it right.” 

Rush finds himself smiling. Because this is... this is a little flattering, and rather sweet. And Young being like this is somehow entirely perfect, even if Rush would've happily fucked him tonight. 

“Alright,” he answers, rubbing his fingers through Young's hair again. “I can do slow.”

“You still want me to stay?” Young asks, and Rush can feel his breath against his lips. It's dizzying, this kind of intimacy with Young. Dizzying and addictive.

“Yeah,” he sighs. “Stay.”

Young grins and lifts their joined hands to press a kiss to Rush's knuckles. It's a surprisingly romantic gesture, and Rush has no idea how to react. He is glad when Young drops his hand and sits down on the bed to take off his shoes, because it gives him the opportunity to do the same thing without having to acknowledge the flush on his face. 

Later, when he's curled around Young's frame, his nose buried in the skin right below the worst of the scrapes on Young's neck, he wonders how long Young has had these feelings for him. Pressing a dry kiss onto the ridge of his spine, Rush lets his eyes fall closed and drifts off to sleep. 

-

Not much changes. _They_ change, obviously. Rush sees Young more often now, and whenever they're in the same room he's almost painfully aware of Young's gaze on him. Sometimes, when no one is looking, Young touches him – nothing too much, just a brush of knuckles against the back of his hand, or a slight nudge of shoulder against shoulder – and Rush feels furtive and flustered and altogether exhilarated when he does. But on the whole, nothing much changes. 

They've been doing this for over three weeks now; soft kisses and gentle touches before curling around one another for sleep, and it's good, but Rush is starting to feel impatient. In fact, impatient is a bit of an understatement. Ever since their first kiss, the want has been building up in his belly to the point where it's become nearly unbearable. For the past two weeks he's been hornier than he's been in years, and he's really tried to keep their pace slow and calm, but Christ, his concentration is shot to hell, and so is his willpower. 

“Are you planning on ever fucking me?” he asks against Young's lips one night, words crude and hand folding over the crotch of Young's trousers. Rush can feel Young's hardness underneath his fingertips, and lets his mouth curl into an impertinent grin. The thought that Young might be in just as needy a state of mind as he is makes him feel vindictively satisfied. It also makes him feel even more desperate for Young's touch. 

“Christ, Rush,” Young says, wrapping his fingers around Rush's wrist, but not pulling him away. 

“You don't want to?” Rush asks, giving the bulge a light squeeze. It's a good hand-full, and he really can't wait to get his hands on Young's naked cock. He's felt Young's erection against his leg, his hip, his back, even, but never without any layers of fabric between them. 

“That's not... No, of course I want to,” Young says, letting the fingers on Rush's wrist trail up the inside of his arm slowly. 

Rush raises his free hand to trace the line of Young's jaw before leaning forward to nip at his bottom lip. Their scrapes are mostly healed by now; the skin still raw and pink and shiny in places, but all of it much less severe looking than before. 

“We're healed.” He lets the hand on Young's crotch drift a little bit lower, until his fingertips nudge right up against his balls. Rush bends closer and kisses the corner of his jaw. “I want to see you come,” he says directly into Young's ear. 

Young lets out a hard breath, and Rush smirks. 

“Are you sure?” Young asks. “Do you really want to do this?” 

Rush bites at his earlobe, a short snap of teeth against delicate skin. “I wanted to do this weeks ago. You were the one who insisted on taking it slow,” he reminds Young. 

His hand has started an easy, gentle rhythm on Young's groin of its own accord, and Young's fingers curl around his wrist once more. This time he does pull Rush's hand away, and Rush watches curiously as Young raises his palm to his lips and places an open-mouthed kiss against it. 

“You'd better be sure, because there's no going back if we do this,” Young says darkly, emphasizing his warning with a quick bite to the fleshy part of his palm. 

Rush is tempted to say something sappy, like 'I'm pretty sure we're already past the point of no return,' but instead he opts to twine his fingers into the hair at the back of Young's head, and pulls him in for a kiss. 

Young opens up to him beautifully, and for a short while Rush is content to feel their tongues twist together, to feel Young's hands dragging him in closer, skimming the skin of his back and his shoulders. It's not enough, though, it never feels like it is, and before long he's stripping Young's shirt off over his head and letting his fingers work on the buckle of Young's belt. 

Young gives as good as he gets, and in a haze of need-fueled desire Rush somehow finds himself manhandled and undressed until he's naked and splayed out on Young's bed. Young is on top of him, bare and flushed, his skin warm and smooth against Rush's. 

“God, Rush, I want to taste you,” Young growls into his ear, and Rush feels his cock jerk in response. Yeah, the thought of Young's mouth has gotten him off more than once – a lot more than once – and knowing Young wants it just as much as he does makes all of this feel as surreal as the first time Young kissed him in the middle of the observation deck. 

“Seems like a good place to start,” he answers, and maybe his voice sounds a little breathless, but Young doesn't comment on it beyond nipping at the edge of his jaw before ducking his head lower and sucking a hard kiss into his neck. 

He doesn't waste time, quickly scooting down until he's kneeling between Rush's knees, his hand rubbing a loose and leisurely pace over his prick. God, just feeling Young's fingers on him is already making his heart race. 

Young looks up at him and gives him a dirty grin. “I bet I'm better at this than you are,” he says with a challenge in his voice, and it startles a laugh out of Rush. If Young really thinks he needs to trick Rush into returning the favor, his tactics are a mite transparent. 

“Convince me,” he answers, and then Young is licking his lips and bending forward, and it's as if everything _stops_ for a few seconds. Nothing matters but the sight of Young kneeling between his thighs. Nothing matters but the slick wet heat engulfing his cock, like a particularly warm homecoming, and Rush can't help but clench his hands in Young's hair – the wild curls his only moorings as his conscious mind seems content to shut down entirely. 

Fuck, he's wanted this for a long time. 

He realizes he may have just said that out loud when Young pulls back and says, “How long?” 

Rush blinks slowly, hears his breath hitch when Young's fist slides calmly up and down his erection, and isn't sure how to answer. “Weeks,” he admits. “Months.” 

Young's hand on him tightens minutely, and Rush feels a moan slip past his lips. 

“That's why you stopped coming, isn't it? To the observation deck.” 

“Jesus, is this really the time to be having this conversation?” Rush bites out, trying not to buck his hips into Young's hand. 

“Just wanna make sure,” Young says, before bending down and letting his tongue trail over his balls, licking and prodding at a deceptively leisurely pace. 

Rush lets out a harsh groan, half in exasperation and half in bliss. Because somehow he had not expected this. Any of this. Young's hand on him, his mouth... the rhythm is slow, but the urgency Rush feels is keen and insistent. 

Without warning, Young pulls back again. 

“I'm trying not to fuck this up,” he says quietly, and Rush lets out a frustrated noise at the loss of stimulation from Young's mouth. It all seems like an incredibly inappropriate time and place to be discussing these things. 

“Get back to doing what you were just doing, and you'll be fine,” he pants, tugging on the hair between his fingers. 

“Rush,” Young says, or asks – it sounds more like a question. 

“God, yes, alright?” he grits out, angling Young's head so he can look him in the eye. “I fucking like you. Jesus.”

Young gives him a small smile, amused and happy and a little bit like he's laughing at Rush, but before Rush has time to parse why his stomach lurches like he's falling, Young's mouth is back on him, lips gliding easily over the flesh of his cock. 

Young's tongue laps along his length and lingers on his tip, flickering playfully against his head before he bobs down deeply, sucking hard and increasing his pace until Rush is squirming uselessly against the mattress. Christ, Young wasn't boasting when he said he was good at this, and the telltale warm tension that's gathering in his belly lets him know it won't be long before he comes. 

“Colonel,” he moans, feeling flushed and helpless. He still has Young's hair clenched between his fingers, but for some reason that only makes him feel even less in control of the situation. “I'm— _fuck_ , I'm going to—”

Young doesn't move back, doesn't heed his warning at all. Instead, he keeps going, seemingly with even more vigor than before. The desire in Rush's lower belly coils tighter and tighter, and he feels sweat prickling against his hairline and in the hollow of his back. Fuck, Young intends to... he wants to...

Young moans around him and Rush feels it tingle all the way from the tip to the base, and suddenly his orgasm spikes through him like an electrical current. It slams into him from the side, hard and intense, and he loses control of his limbs for a few seconds as his hips undulate and his cock pulses and spills inside Young's mouth. 

“Oh... oh my God,” he hears himself croak, and he'd be embarrassed if his entire body didn't feel like it dissolved into a warm, happy puddle. 

Young gives him one last suck as he flicks his tongue over Rush's head, and Rush flinches a little – too sensitive. Then Young is drawing away, and he makes to lie down next to Rush as he lets him recover. 

There's a slightly cocky set to Young's smile when he looks over at him, and Rush can't even find the energy to roll his eyes at Young. Because yeah, the man kind of has the right to feel self-confident after what he just did. 

Fuck, he feels good. Satisfied and wrung out, and Rush can't imagine getting up and repaying the favor in kind, right now. 

He casts his eyes downward, taking in Young's cock, flushed and hard against his belly, and rolls onto his side to let his hand trail slowly up its length. He's hot to the touch, already slippery with precome, and Rush feels his lips curl into a smile when Young bites off a soft moan at the contact. 

“You liked doing that,” he murmurs against Young's cheek, as his fingertip glides smoothly over the tip of his cock. 

“Hmm,” Young answers, moving his face to the side to catch Rush's lips in a kiss. 

Rush allows it for a moment or two, content to taste himself on Young's tongue as he slowly rubs his fingers along Young's prick. 

“Your mouth on me,” he says as he draws back just the slightest bit. “Wanna feel that again.” 

There's no more than half a centimeter of space between their lips, and he can feel Young's breathing pick up a little. He flicks out his tongue to lick at Young's top lip, and curls his hand a little firmer around his prick. 

“What else do you want?” Young asks, voice full of gravel. 

“I want to take you into my mouth, feel you on my tongue,” Rush says, letting his hand stroke up and down Young's length a few times. “Swallow you down until you fall apart.” 

Young lets out a hard breath and pushes a little into Rush's fist. God, his cock feels good in Rush's hand, warm, and thick, and slightly curved. Fuck. 

“I want you to open me up. Want you to fuck me so hard I'll feel it for _days_ ,” he continues, settling on a steady pace with his fist. “Want you to make me scream. Make me come with your name on my lips.”

“God, Rush,” Young moans as his eyes slip shut. 

“Yeah,” Rush answers, relishing the way Young's breathing is becoming a little erratic. The rhythm of his hand picks up, and Young makes a small sound in the back of his throat. Rush presses a short kiss into the side of Young's mouth, before speaking again. “Want to ride you. Get you all the way inside me. Let you fill me up entirely.” 

“Yeah.” Young sounds almost delirious, his face a mask of intense concentration. It's beautiful, the way he seems nearly overwrought by the words Rush is feeding him. A warm trickle of precome drips down the length of Young's cock, and eases the slide of Rush's hand even further. Rush feels something nervous tickle at the back of his throat, but he swallows it away and grins savagely before leaning even closer to Young's face. 

“And then I want to fuck _you_ ,” he says, emphasizing his words with a sharp nip to Young's bottom lip. 

“ _Jesus_ ,” Young groans, bucking his hips up into the tight circle of Rush's hand, and oh yes, that is a nice reaction. 

“Gonna make you mine. Make sure you know who you belong to,” he says right into the shell of Young's ear. God, his voice sounds wrecked, and he's pretty sure Young can tell that this is doing just as much to him as it is to Young. “Gonna make you enjoy it more than you'll know what to do with, Colonel. Want to see you twist in my grip. Gonna make you curse until you lose it.” Young lets out a shuddery breath and squeezes his eyes closed even tighter, and Rush feels his own balls throb a little at the sight in front of him. 

“I'll fuck you until you beg me for more,” he promises Young. “And then I'll make you come so hard you'll see stars.” 

“God,” Young says, curling his arm up to twine his hand into the hair at the back of Rush's head. His hips are snapping up into his fist in a frenzied pace, now. “ _Fuck_ , yeah.” 

“I want to do everything,” Rush goes on, letting Young thrust into his hand freely. He can tell Young is close from the way his breath hitches and how he keeps losing his rhythm. A drop of sweat runs from Young's forehead down over the curve of his temple. Rush inches forward to lick it away before he moves back again and takes in Young's face as he hovers on the edge of orgasm. Fuck, Young is beautiful. “I wanna do everything with you,” he rasps. He does. “But right now I really want to see you come all over yourself, Colonel.”

Young moans, deep and loud, his voice choked with a desperate desire that makes Rush want to own him completely. Jesus, it's so much better than in his fantasies. Rush presses a soft kiss into the skin under Young's ear, and then whispers, “Come for me.” 

Young's eyes spring open and find his, and Young makes a broken sound before squeezing them closed again and arching up into Rush's hand. Rush watches in awe at Young's mouth, wide and slack, as his cock spurts its release over his own stomach and Rush's hand. 

Young breathes hard for a few moments, and then he laughs, pulling Rush in for a kiss. It's deeper, this time, and Rush finds himself smiling into it. 

“Christ, you've got a mouth on you,” Young says. 

“Don't tell me you expected anything less,” Rush murmurs, using the edge of the covers to wipe away the worst of the mess without looking. They can worry about laundry and come stains tomorrow. For now, he just wants to sleep, tucked into the crook of Young's arm. As he settles in against Young's warm skin, resting his head on Young's chest, he deliberately steers his mind away from thoughts about whether they can make this work, or how one day all of this might end painfully.

Young huffs out an amused breath, and Rush feels it ruffle his hair. It's a better distraction from his own thoughts than perhaps it should be. 

“All of it,” Young murmurs quietly. 

“'S that?” Rush asks, eyes already drooping shut. 

“Wanna do all of what you said,” Young says, and Rush feels the corners of his mouth lift up in answer. He does, too. 

“Tomorrow,” he replies. 

Tomorrow they will. Right now, though, what he wants more than anything is to sleep. 

He barely feels Young press a kiss onto the crown of his head before he finally succumbs to slumber.


End file.
